‘Agents of SHIELD: Academy’ Takes Super Fans For A Real Ride

As the Marvel universe continues to expand, ABC’s Agents of SHIELD settles in with news that the network has greenlit a fourth season.

While the newly released MARVEL films are promotion within themselves, the Agents of SHIELD series has also become a way to explore other lesser known characters, who operate on the sidelines in parallel with the events in the films.

This kind of engagement appears to be central to the story telling from both Joss and Jed Whedon — aside from the engaging story telling itself — who co-created the series with Jed’s wife Maurissa Tancharoen.

One level of engagement works through the consistently creative marketing for the series, and now the Agents of SHIELD: Academy web series is doing exactly that.

What the web-series is meant to do is cast a winner of the Lexus-sponsored show to appear in the new season.

The car company sponsored an Agents of SHIELD web series last year, called Double Agent, which was nominated for a Producers Guild award for outstanding digital series, along with Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee.

In the new reality series, the three contestants are a math & science teacher Noelle Mabry, student Frank Moran, and a bartender Ralph Lammie, Jr.

Noelle Mabry’s Facebook and Twitter accounts at the very least, have little on them, and at the most there is no mention of the show, which makes sense as they’re probably not allowed to say anything about it.

Frank Moran doesn’t appear to be on social media, but the most public of the three would be Ralph Lammie, who aside from being on Agents of SHIELD: Academy, appears to have already been on a few projects, according to his IMDB page.

And his Facebook page shows a video clip from the hit show Underground, which seems to feature him.

And judging from what he follows on Twitter, he also seems to be into working out, so he stands a pretty good chance at getting the part; that is if he has to do his own stunts or the training in this web series is part of the Agents of SHIELD look.

Agents of SHIELD at Comic Con 2014, sponsored by LEXUS [image by Chad Kainz via Flickr | CC BY 2.0]It would, however, make sense that an actor would be among the three Agents of SHIELD super fans, as most large distributed reality shows, especially for the web, take place near the film capital, and his location reads as Los Angeles.

And the set up for the show likely took place in one day, and it’s perhaps safe to assume from the way it’s shot that each person is singled out from the group.

Also it’s been said that cast members from the show will be making appearances throughout the web series.

What happens outside the Agents of SHIELD, still stays in the MARVEL universe. [Image by Heschong viaFlickr |CC BY 2.0]It’s been noticed long since the show was underway, that the plots in the show are woven into the rest of the Marvel universe to the point where it’s become breakthrough television, as well as smart marketing.

For instance, Zap2It made this very clear towards the end of the first season of Agents of SHIELD during the release of Captain America: Winter Soldier.

Now that it has the freedom to be the series it was always intended to, “Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD” has turned into a fantastic show. Its connection to Marvel’s Cinematic Universe is clear: This is where viewers get to see the fallout of HYDRA’s SHIELD infiltration. And the fact that the movie so influenced the show is game-changing in terms of how the mediums of film and television can be interwoven.

According to the Futon Critic, “The remaining four episodes will post at 9:00 a.m. PDT: March 23, April 6, April 20 and May 4.”

Agents of SHIELD returns for the last half of its third season every Tuesday night on ABC.